


Lost and Found

by paint_me_a_revolution



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Angst, Introspection, Judaism, Religion, author is an angsty jewish kid and it shows, mentions of others - Freeform, sorry folks, there's no comfort here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-15
Updated: 2019-09-15
Packaged: 2020-10-19 11:54:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20656814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paint_me_a_revolution/pseuds/paint_me_a_revolution
Summary: Stanley tries to find himself after the summer that shouldn't have been





	Lost and Found

This is supposed to be the summer where Stanley finds God, but he’s never felt farther from Him in his life. _God has abandoned us, _he thinks outside the house on Neibolt Street, listening to his friends scream, and again on the inside, blood running down his face and fear pounding in his heart.

_God has abandoned me, _Stan revises, open palm stinging, a false smile tugging at the stitches on his face. It feels, sometimes, like his skin is a mask. Like someone’s sewed a smiling face over the gaping hole that’s left of Stanley and painted on a grin so the rest of the world doesn’t see him screaming. “I have to go,” he says, and he doesn’t look back until the fence swings behind him and he’s safe in his own backyard. His mom looks at his hand when he comes in and rushes him to the emergency room again. The nurse who stitches him up looks at his bandaged face and pulls Stan aside, tells him he can tell the staff anything. They’ll _help._

“I know,” Stan says. _You can’t help, _he thinks. _No one can help me._

Things get worse, and they never get better. School starts; there’s nowhere to hide under the fluorescent lights, and people stare and point and think Stan can’t see them when they laugh. His friends think they can shield him, Ben and Richie and Eddie and Big Bill. _You’re making it worse, _Stan wants to say. He bites his tongue and closes his eyes and prays instead. God doesn’t answer him. God never answers him.

Stan prays every night. Lying in his bed, he begs God to take him away from it all. He begs for freedom, for safety, for peace. He gets none of it. “Maybe you’re praying wrong,” Richie says once, and he doesn’t mean it but Stan can’t stop worrying. _Maybe I’m praying wrong, _he thinks, and it consumes him. That night he repeats the prayers, over and over until the words run together. _Get it right, Stanley. Get it right. You have to get it right. _He doesn’t tell Richie. He doesn’t tell anyone.

For the first time in his life, Stanley’s grades slip. He hurries home every day before someone can stop him; a teacher, a friend, he doesn’t care. He doesn’t want any of them to notice him. The bandages come off in October, and someone calls him a freak. Freak, Stan thinks, is better than some of the other things he’s been called. That doesn’t stop it from hurting. His mom starts asking questions. Is he okay? Are kids being mean at school? Why isn’t he hanging out with those nice boys?

“They’re busy,” he tells her, and ducks his head so she won’t see the lie in his eyes. Not that she ever looks in his eyes anymore. Like everyone else, Mrs Uris only sees the scars. “I’m busy, too. Can you go, please?”

And maybe, Stan thinks, it’s better like this. He sees his friends in the hallway, at lunch, in the parking lot after school, and he stares at his feet and hurries by and pretends every time that he can’t hear them calling. It’s better, he thinks, to cut these ties now, before the hooks of this friendship bury themselves too deep to be removed. Stanley hasn’t found God, he thinks. He’s found something better. He’s found himself.

_He’s never been more lost. _


End file.
